Serving advanced learners (and their teachers) since 2012.
Printable List
Click up an interesting, visual writing prompt suitable for any grade or purpose.
Students use 12 random phrases to create a story that takes place in space!
We tell students to ‘show, not tell’ — but that advice is useless until they experience the difference. This lesson makes it click.
Five emoji. One story. Where will your imagination take you?
We’ll show students how to add more variety to their writing by starting sentences with a reason, a prepositional phrase, and a simile.
Reduce anxiety by breathing in a square pattern.
Can someone do the right thing, but for the wrong reason?
Place value is something we cover in elementary school. It seems simple, but I’d wager that very few adults really understand the topic. I sure didn’t until I worked with non-base-10 number systems in college. Your students can get a taste of this mind-boggling experience by imagining what it would be like if we didn’t have the number 9. What would each digit represent then?
Learn to lead a lesson that is built entirely on student curiosity.
Have you ever noticed that some stories have awfully similar problems? What if we looked for the most unusual way of solving a repeating problem?
Your class will become a wonderland of imaginary creates with Greek and Latin names.
When fractions take on a new denominator, it’s as if they’re wearing a disguise – same value, new look. So let’s write a story about fraction equivalence starring a fraction who needs to fit in with a new group.
You only have six digits to form three fractions. Can you combine them to get to 0?
A mysterious image. Reveal it slowly. Let your students wonder!
When a student’s brain is full of worries, everything feels urgent. Brain Plate helps them sort what’s real from what’s noise — and actually do something about it.
We’ll start with the cliché “as cold as ice” and go somewhere much more interesting.
A passage from “Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde” to use as a mentor text, discussion starter, or writing prompt.
Want something to do during the holiday season that is both fun and involves thinking? Get students writing about what a snowman would think about Halloween or what a ghost would think about Thanksgiving.
The Eiffel Tower, the Colosseum, the Sydney Opera House — group them, pick the best from each group, then design your own.
How I accidentally discouraged curiosity in my classroom.
Reduce anxiety by learning to “change the channel.”
Let’s use factors to encode and decode words.
Your students will set up a tournament to determine which person or character best demonstrated resiliency.
Adults can limit anxiety by implementing the Five Question Rule.
We’ll take two seemingly unrelated pieces of content (say volcanoes and the human body) and then build analogies to connect the two ideas. In the end, students can create a skit, comic, or story relating the two concepts.
Do you know someone who becomes a bit overexcited by ideas?
What’s going on in this room? There are shoes everywhere! Are those… oranges? Let’s make some inferences!
No video gets me more email from students! How few colors can you use to color in any map so that no two, neighboring regions are the same color?
